Showdown At Centerpoint

by Roger MacBride Allen

that you are unaware of the change. An interesting demonstration of the

  difference in our perceptions." Lando glared at the protocol droid.

  "Threepio," he said in an artificially, calm voice, "if the next words from

  you are not an explanation of the problem, I am going to power you down

  right now and permanently disable your speech center. What is the problem?"

  Threepio seemed about to protest, then thought better of it. "it is, quite

  simply, Captain Calrissian, that the visible light output from the Glowpoint

  has increased six percent in the last five minutes." "Anakin!" Jacen could

  fed his little brother nearby, and he knew perfectly well that Anakin could

  sense Jacen's presence. But all the knowing back and forlh in the world, all

  the ability to zero in on each other's location, did not do much good in the

  current situation. For Jacen could also sense that Anakin was scared and

  feeling guilty, feeling sorry for what he had done. It was a wonderful

  paradox, in a sense. If there was ever a kid in the history of the galaxy

  who dcseived to be in trouble, it was Anakin Solo, now, today. After all,

  they had been trying to keep this place hidden. Anakin couldn't have made it

  more visible if he had tried. But the sheer magnitude of what he had done

  made it all but impossible to hold him responsible. Anakin couldn't possibly

  have understood what he was doing, or he never would have done it. He was

  just a little boy who liked to play with machines. Jacen thought back to a

  few incidents in his own life when his parents had let him off easier than

  they might have. Nothing this big, of course, but the point was the same.

  Jacen had always thought those had been times he had gotten off easy, gotten

  lucky. Now he was not so sure. Maybe it hadn't been him being lucky, but his

  parents being understanding. "Anakin! It's all right! Nobody's mad at you."

  Well, Chewbacca wasn't exactly thrilled with him, and Aunt Marcha wasn't all

  that pleased with him for getting her hovercar vaporized or getting her head

  cut open. If and when they ever got Q9-X2 working again, he was not likely

  to express his gratitude for what Anakin had done. But no one was mad. Not

  exactly. "Come on out," Jacen knew perfectly well it was no good chasing

  Anakin or going in after him. He would just run away. hide again. Jacen

  would have to get him to come out on his own. "I wanna stay here!" Anakin

  called out. That was, strangely enough, a good first step. Jacen knew his

  brother well enough to know he was asking to be talked out of what he had

  just said. "Come on, Anakin," Jacen said. "You can't stay there forever/'

  "Can so!" "But it's getting dark." For reasons best known to the beings who

  had built this place, the steady, perfect illumination the chamber had

  produced from out of nowhere when it was cone-shaped wasn't there anymore

  now that it was open to the sky. And night was coming on. "What about food?"

  Jacen went on. "Aren't you hungry?" "Weil,' maybe a little." "Maybe a lot,"

  Jacen said. "Tell you what. Why don't you come get something to eat, and

  then if you want to go back to hiding, you can." The suggestion made no

  sense at all, of course, but that was all right. It gave Anakin a way to

  save face, a way to back down. There was a long silence-and that was a good

  sign too. Anakin was thinking about it. Jacen waited for a minute, and then

  gave it another try. "Anakin? Come on back to the camp-to the ship-and have

  some food." He couldn't really invite him to the camp. There wasn't much of

  a camp left. Everything that hadn't been inside the Falcon had been burned

  to a crisp. "Can I really come back and hide later if I want to?" Anakin

  asked. "All you want," Jacen promised, knowing how easy it would be to keep

  that promise. After all, Anakin hadn't needed permission to run away and

  hide the first lime. He wouldn't need it the next time, cither, assuming

  they didn't pul a round-the-clock guard on him or lock him up and weld the

  hatch shut. And Jacen wouldn't put it past Anakin to manage an escape even

  with a guard and a locked door. "Well, all right. Wait a second," After a

  moment Anakin appeared at the entrance to the corridor. He paused there and

  looked toward his big brother . "It's all right, Anakin, really.'' Of

  course, thoic was very little that was all right, but Anakin knew what Jacen

  meant. Anakin came forward, slowly at first, then suddenly he was running as

  fast as he could. He threw his arms around Jacen and Jacen hugged him back.

  "I'm sorry. Jacen. I didn't mean to do anything bad. Honest." "I know, I

  know. But what you mean to do really doesn't count so much, sometimes. It's

  what happens that matters." Jacen could almost hear his father telling him

  the same thing. Suddenly he found himself thinking not of what his father or

  mother would do-but about them. They were probably in trouble too, out

  there, somewhere. The last any of them knew about their parents was that

  they had remained behind, trapped in Corona House, when Chewbacca had gotten

  the three children, Q9, and Ebrihim out. Were they still there? Or had Dad's

  cousin Thrackan locked them up someplace else? Or had they gotten away,

  somehow'.1 Jacen suddenly felt a wave of guilt pass over him. Why hadn't he

  worried about them more, thought about them more? "I miss Mom and Dad,"

  Anakin announced, with his face mashed up against Jacen's shoulder, his

  voice a little muffled and a little snuffly. Jacen was surprised to hear his

  brother say that just then. It would seem Anakin's mind worked a bit more

  like Jacen's than Jacen had thought. "So do I." Jaccn said. "So do I. Come

  on. Let's go back to the others.1' The two boys walked hand in hand toward

  the center of the massive chamber. Anakin slowly settled down enough to take

  an interest in his surroundings. He looked up toward where the top of the

  conical chamber had been, toward where the sky was now. "Boy." he said.

  "Things have really changed." "Yeah," agreed Jacen. "They sure have." He

  looked up himself and was astonished all over again by the sight. The sky

  was getting dark, and so was the interior of the chamber, but the silvery

  surface did a good job of reflecting what light there was. It was probably

  just about sunset, but there was no real way to know. All they could see was

  a perfectly circular patch of dark sky, exactly overhead, right at the

  zenith, with the gleaming shadows of the seven silver cones stabbing into

  the edge of that perfect circle of night. Jacen could see stars starting to

  peek through, here and there. They walked on, toward the Falcon, moving a

  bit more carefully as they pic ked their way through the heaps of burnt-up

  belongings. Everything that had been outside the ship was reduced to melted

  puddles and to ashes. Jacen and Anakin paused again to get a look at the

  Falcon. "The ship's broken again," Anakin said. It was not a question.

  "Uh-huh. It looks like all the propulsion systems blew out before Chewbacca

  could get the shields up." Anakin nodded slowly. "That isn't good," he said.

  Jacen looked straight up, at the top of the cylinder, something like a

  kilometer or two over their heads. Unless Chewbacca could get the ship

  running, or unless some
one could figure a way to walk straight up the side

  of the smooth, slick, sheer, impenetrable walls. they were stuck down here.

  "It sure isn't," Jaccn agreed. "Come on," he said. He almost told Anakin

  they were all wailing for him. but then it occurred to him that would nol

  exactly encourage his brother to Step lively. "Let's go in." The Duchess

  Marcha of Mastigophorous sal in the lounge of the Millennium Falcon, feeling

  downright gloomy. The company was not enlivening. Her nephew. Ebrihim, was

  playing a dispiriled game of sabacc with Jaina, The fact thai Jaina had lost

  several hands showed just how low her spirils were. Q9, or whal was left of

  him, was propped up againsl Ihe far bulkhead of the compartmenl. He reminded

  Marcha all too closely ot a mummified corpse no one had golten around lo

  burying. She herself had a pounding headache, though she knew that she could

  counl herself lucky to have no more serious complainls than that. It was a

  miracle that none of them had been killed. Well, maybe Q9 hud been killed.

  At least Chewbacca had not been able to revive him. Of course, it might not

  matlcr that much who was alive and who was dead right now. They were trapped

  here, and most of their rations had been outside the Falcon, either stored

  on the hovercar or else in storage crates that had been stacked outside ihc

  spacecraft to make room. The Falcon'?, emergency stores would lasl for a

  while, but not forever. Marcha's besl guess, which she had not shared with

  anyone, was that they had perhaps enough water for six days and enough food

  for ten. And they might well be lucky if they were alive long enough to

  worry about such things. She agreed with Chewbacca that it was all bul

  certain that the repul- sor's violent awakening had wiped out the Drallists,

  and good riddance, but there was bound to be someone who had been far enough

  away to survive the disturbance and had noticed it. She saw two

  possibilities. Perhaps Drall scientists would notice the seismic

  convulsions, or the electrical disturbances or whatever, and come take a

  look. However, thai seemed a trifle improbable, as there was, after all, a

  war on, most public institutions had been shut down, and there were massive

  travel restrictions in effect. Unpleasant as it might be to concede the

  point, it seemed far more likely that a military group of some sort,

  equipped to detect repulsion activity, would have seen a burst of repulsor

  power bright enough to blow out their detector screens and corne to

  investigate. It seemed most unlikely that it would be anyone pleasant who

  arrived under those circumstances. And leaving behind the trifling problem

  of the sort of thing most of the military groups in the system were likely

  to do to captured enemy civilians, there was the question of what they could

  do with the planetary repulsor, once it was in their possession. Lots of

  unsavory people had been looking for the things for a long time. Marcha did

  not know what they hoped to do with the repulsor, but she doubted it would

  be anything good. AH she knew was that the enemy regarded the rcpulsors as

  vitally, urgently important. It was not beyond the realm of possibility that

  by handing this one over to the enemy, Anakin had lost the entire war,

  single-handed. But these opinions, too, she kept to herself. Things were bad

  enough already, and there was no sense making them worse right now, when

  they would no doubt deteriorate on their own in due course. Their one hope

  seemed to be that Chewbacca coutd get the Falcon's propulsion systems

  working again. The Wookiee was working on the problem now, rooting around in

  all the access panels, knee-deep in cables and burned-out parts. She could

  hear him from here, banging and thudding about. He was doing his best, no

  doubt, but Marcha had strong doubts that he would succeed. It seemed likely

  that what had knocked them out was the initial massive burst of repulsor

  power so strong that it had managed to jump across open circuits. In all

  likelihood, a similar electromagnetic pulse had blown out Q9. No, the

  situation was not good. Not one little bit good. And it seemed unlikely to

  do anything but get worse. She heard the sound of footsteps coming up the

  Falcon's entry ramp and looked up in time to see Jacen and Anakin come into

  the lounge. Ebrihim and Jaina looked up as well. It would seem that

  Chewbacca heard them also, as he appeared in the door and stood there a

  moment or two after the two boys came in. "Hi, everyone," Anakin said. "I'm

  back. I'm-I'm real sorry for what I did. I didn't mean to hurt anything-but

  I did. I'm sorry." A miracle of understatement, that, Whai the child had

  done might well have condemned millions to a life under tyranny, Marcha

  could even at least imagine a scenario where loss of the repulsor meant loss

  of the war for the New Republic, so damaging the New Republic's prestige

  that it collapsed altogether. Quite a lot to put on one small child's

  shoulders. "It'll be all right, Anakin," Jaina said. "We'll find a way to

  fix it all. Don't you worry." Marcha exchanged a glance with her nephew, and

  then with the Wookiee. Clearly neither of them was in any more of a mood for

  empty platitudes than she was. But sometimes platitudes we're all one had

  left. And there were times when a completely unreasoned, and unreasonable,

  expression of optimism was absolutely necessary. "Of course it will be all

  right," she heard herself saying as she stood up and moved a step or two

  toward him. "Corne here, Anakin." Suddenly the child burst into tears,

  rushed over to her, and flung his arms around her. "There, there.'^she said

  putting her arms around him. "There, there." If she had known, exactly, what

  she meant by the comforting words, she might have found them comforting

  herself.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Seeing the Light I suppose I won't iike the answer if I ask you if this

  thing can go any faster," said Lando. The turbo-vator car continued its

  stately descent down to the equator line of Holiowtown and the nearest way

  out. The Glowpoint had started brightening when they were just about at the

  midpoint of their descent. Jenica Sorisen shook her head. "No, you wouldn't

  like the answer," she said. "I had a feeling you'd say that." Lando looked

  up through the turbovator car's overhead viewport. The Glowpoint was

  dazzlingiy bright, but the question was, how much brighter and how fast was

  it brightening. Could he judge it any better by looking at the ground, at

  the reflected light, rather than at the source? He peered intemly at the

  ground for a moment, then gave it up. Threepio, annoyingly enough, had been

  right for once. The human eye was just too good at adjusting for changes in

  brightness. There was no way he could make an eyeball estimate of how fast

  it was getting worse. He could ask Threepio, of course, but even in the

  midst of this crisis, there was a part of him that didn't want to give the

  droid the satisfaction. Besides, Golden Boy would probably just start giving

  a running report of brightness levels and drive them all crazy. 'I'd say

  we're up to a twenty percent brightness increase," Luke announced. Of

  course. With his Jedi contr
ol over his senses, he would he able to make that

  sort of estimate. "But the brightness isn't all of it. As we go lower, we're

  going to get into thicker air that can hold a lot of heat." Luke turned to

  Sonsen. "How high a temperature can this car take?" he asked. Sonsen

  shrugged. "How should 1 know? i doubt if anyone ever bothered to figure it

  out. It's a glorified elevator, not a spacecraft. But it's definitely

  getting hot in here." "There is indeed a significant temperature rise

  already," said Threepio. "If you wish, I could gladly provide you with a

  running account of-" "No, we would not wish," Lando said. "There's nothing

  we can do about it anyway." He held the palm of his hand flat over the

  interior wall of the elevator car, and then, very gingerly, touched it with

  just the tip of his index finger. "The skin of this thing is getting warmer

  though, and the heat is percolating through. No doubt about it." "How long

  until we're out of here?" Kalenda asked. "Another five minutes or so,"

  Sonsen said. "But there's a flaw." "What flaw?" Lando asked. This place was

  clearly bad news. "There's a pressure differential between the equatorial

  region of Hollowtown and Shell One, on the other side of the lock. No big

  deal, maybe an eight percent differential, but it's enough that you have to

  use an airlock. The main turhovator airlock jammed up during the second

  flare. It was never meant to do more than match the slight pressure

  differential between Hollowtown and Shell One. I managed to get it working

  again after the flare, but it wasn't easy, and I'm not so sure my repair is

  going to hold up." "So we're stuck," Lando said. "Heavens! We'll all be

  roasted alive," Threepio said. "You speak when you're spoken to," Sonsen

  said, obviously starting to share Lando's opinion of the protocol droid.

  "We're not stuck," she said to the others. "There's a personnel lock right

  next to the turhovator airlock. It's smaller and simpler, and it got a lot

  more use, so it's a real heavy-duty job. I'm sure it'll still be working. If

  we can't get the turbovator lock running, we'll have to make a run for the

  personnel lock." "But you did happen to mcnlion there's no oxygen left out

  there," Luke said. "Even if there were any oxygen left, it would probably

  kill you to breathe out there. Very high COa levels, plus all sorts of toxic